Part 2

After fifteen years of obscurity, his gym was fast-becoming popular again. He had begun to charge admissions again to fans and promoters who were eager to see the Tank at work. Once again during the afternoon workouts there was the hum and roar of spectators, the slap-slur of springing feet on the canvas followed by the booming of fists echoing from rib-cage and jaw-bone structure. There was the smell of money in his gym now, along with the smells of leather and oil.

The door behind him opened and Hannigan turned to Charlie Jingle.

"'Lo, Charlie."

"'Lo, Mish.... How's he look?"

"Terrific! If I didn't know him for twenty years, I'd swear he was brand, spankin' new!"

Charlie Jingle grunted quietly and walked to the plate-glass window. He looked down at them there in the white-roped square, watched the Tanker attack with a quick-reflex attack, block a flurry of counter-blows, weave under a right-hand smash to the head, and rock Hammerhead Johnny to the ropes with a combination of shoulder-straight jabs to the stomach and a cross-hand right to the chest. A hum of approval and amazement went up from the spectators.

"Charlie!" shrieked Mischa Hannigan. "Charlie, did you see that? And that Hammerhead Johnny is supposed to be the most stable Pug in the business. They say he's got magnets in his feet, can't nobody break the contact of--"

"Calm down, calm down, it's only practice."

"Practice he calls it! If Hammerhead could bust up the Tank, don't you think he would?"

"Hammerhead's an old junkpot, Mich, and you know it!"

"Old he may be, Charlie, but junkpot he's not. Crafty as a damn president of Pugs, Inc., he is, and everybody in the business knows it. He ranks with the best sparrin' partners in the world, he does."

In the ring below something happened that drew a roar of uncontrollable excitement from the crowd. It was over in a flash and nobody saw quite how it happened. Hammerhead Johnny's body described a rigid, dark arc in the air, hovered suspended a second in a completely horizontal position, and then crashed with a hollow boom to the deck. The Hammerhead did not move.

"BEGREE!" howled the delighted Mischa Hannigan. "BEGREE, he's knocked him cold!" He began to dance around the room in a jig that shook his frame with every jolt and pirouette. Charlie Jingle laughed.

"I'll be dammed! The Tank's really got it! He really has got it!"

"Oh, we're rich, we're rich, we're rich!" chanted the hysterical Hannigan, dancing his macabre dance of the human puff-ball. There was a knock at the door and Hannigan, still chanting, danced to the door and opened it. The relaxed puffy flesh drew tight, his back stiffened. Charlie Jingle peered around his girth to see who stood there.

Harry Belok, in a black Homburg and a blue pin-stripe suit, stepped smiling into the room, twirling an ebony cane. He doffed his hat, bowing slightly. Behind him a small man slid in next to the wall, his whole body screwed up tightly into his neck. Hannigan, with a pale, sickly smile, shut the door.

"If it ain't Harry Belok! Hello, Harry."

Harry Belok, smiling, looked straight at Charlie Jingle. "Whadayasay, Hannigan! How's things, Charlie? Long time no see, hah?"

Charlie Jingle, with a tightness in his throat, mirrored the sick expression of Mischa Hannigan. He smiled a smile so forced his flesh stretched like a rubber mask out of control.

"Hello, Harry. What can I do for you?"

"'S this way, Charlie-mo. I just seen your boy work out. I just seen him club the Hammerhead to the deck with the weirdest combination I ever seen. It's somethin' new, he's got. Somethin' original! Know what I mean?" Harry Belok stopped pacing, stopped twirling, to look at Charlie Jingle. Charlie Jingle waited.

"Well--I hear around the grapevine that Pugs, Inc., don't relish the thought of givin' your boy a crack at Iron-Man. Is that true, Charlie-mo?"

Charlie Jingle shrugged.

"It don't mean a thing, Harry. You know that as well as anybody."

"Yeah, Charlie-mo. But you know as well as anybody that the Fight Commission has got a rules book as thick as this room. If Pugs, Inc., really wants to, they'll find some kinda statute that disqualifies your boy for the championship. Now, you don't want _that_ to happen, do you?"

Charlie Jingle began to feel the heat flushing up behind his eyeballs. "What's the pitch, Harry?"

"I think maybe what you ought to do, Charlie-mo, is lemme buy a chunk out of your boy. Then I guarantee you get the match."

"What makes you think I don't get the match anyway, Harry?"

Harry Belok turned, pointing his stick through the glass to the gym.

"Look down there. You see any reporters there? You see any cameras shootin'?"

Charlie Jingle did not move, keeping his eyes unblinking on Belok.

"Okay. There's no reporters. No press build-up. Pugs, Inc., has put the freeze on. So? What's the point?"

"The point," said Harry Belok, tapping Charlie Jingle's chest with the white-tipped stick, "the point, is that you don't get no match from Iron-Man unless you play ball with me!"

Charlie Jingle squinted at him through a cloud of brown-blue smoke. "Can't do it, Harry-mo," he said quietly.

"You serious?"

"Dead serious," said Charlie Jingle.

"You get too serious, that's the way you liable to wind up," said Harry Belok through his teeth. He turned and stomped toward the door and went out. The little man against the wall slid out after him.

Charlie Jingle walked nonchalantly to the door, hooked his foot behind it, and kicked it shut with a loud slam. Mischa Hannigan took a handkerchief from his pocket, wiping his brow.

"You've gone crazy, Charlie. You've gone stark ravin' mad!"

Charlie Jingle whirled.

"All these years, Mish, I starved and sweated in tank-joints. All these years I broke my back, and nobody lifted a finger except a choice one or two. Now I've got a crack at somethin' good and everybody wants in. Well I don't want them in! I want them to stay clear, and lemme go my own way! Is that crazy?"

"But Charlie," moaned Mischa Hannigan. "You can't go laughin' at the Fixer like that! Don't you have enough worries without gettin' killed?"

Charlie Jingle looked at him a blank moment and then laughed. He turned, looking toward the ring below. The Tanker was on the Gym floor, looking up. He waved. Charlie turned to Hannigan.

"Can you get me the Jawbreaker to spar with Tanker, Mish?"

Hannigan sank slowly into his leather chair behind the beat-up, rusting metal desk. He rubbed a patch of rust with his thumb.

"Sure. Sure I can get the Jawbreaker. Can you get the match?"

"You just watch my dust," said Charlie, and went out.

Mischa Hannigan crinkled his nose. He began to feel his asthma coming on.

* * * * *

"Are you crazy, Jingle?" roared the apoplectic Commissioner Jergen. "I can't get myself wrapped up in ring politics! I'm a fight commissioner, not a goddam promoter!"

Charlie took a few steps toward the Commissioner, leveling a finger at him in indictment.

"Now you lemme tell you somethin'. You run the fight game, but the only thing you're interested in is your own goddam reputation. The only time you ever get up off your fat keister is when somebody publicly pulls a quick deal that looks phony. Then you roar up from the saddle and start screaming 'foul'--_only_ because it makes you look bad if you don't!"

"I can have you cited for contempt--"

"I don't give one damn in hell what you can have me cited for! I thought you were one square guy. But all you are is a bloody politician like all the others! You're here to make sure the fight racket gets a fair-deal. Well I'm getting the old freeze-away, and you still sit on your keister and don't do a damned thing!"

"You damn midget!" croaked the Commissioner, and Charlie Jingle whirled, fists cocked, his face working up a nice purple color. "What'd you call me, Fatso?"

"I called you a damn midget, and if you don't like it, I dare you take a poke at me!" said the Commissioner, and coming around his desk he thrust his jaw out toward Charlie Jingle's cocked fists.

Jingle drew his fist back and stopped. Slowly he dropped the cocked hand by his side.

"Oh, no! Oh, no you don't! You'd just love me to do it, wouldn't you? A half-hour later I'd lose my license for conduct unbecoming a fight trainer."

The Commissioner straightened up slowly, glaring out from under thick grey eyebrows at Charlie Jingle's face.

"You think I'd pull _that_?"

"Goddam right you'd pull it! For all I know, you may even be working for Pugs, Inc."

Fight Commissioner Jergen rocked back on his heels as if he had just taken a blow between the eyes. He sank slowly into his chair, staring in stillborn amazement at Charlie Jingle.

"Wait a minute, Charlie. You mean to say--Listen, boy, what's happening to you? You know better than to say something like that to me!"

Charlie Jingle suddenly felt a hollowness in his stomach.

"I'm sorry, Jergen. I don't know what's the matter with me. This thing's got me sore. They got me goin', and there's nothin' I can do about it. I called the press. I told them that Pugs, Inc. and Tanker Bell had come to an agreement. I even quoted a fight date. I look in the papers the next day. Nothing! They got me sewed up tight. I come here as a last resort.... I'm sorry I shot off my mouth!"

Charlie Jingle turned and started out.

"Now wait a minute, Charlie...." Charlie Jingle turned. "You see, I know all about these kinds of deals in the game. Have known about them for years. But they keep me shut out because I can't prove anything. If you go to court as a witness, Pugs, Inc. will have fifteen other witnesses. They'll even have a taped recording of your conversation with them, which they juggle and splice to fit their purposes. You'll hear things coming off a tape which you damn well know you didn't say or mean. But you'll have to admit it's your voice; you were there, the other guys in the room were there--and they got you nailed. See what I mean? They're big business. They got it sewed."

"You mean there's nothing to do?"

"I mean there are ways. All you've got to do is sneak yourself into the public eye. Once that happens, the public asks questions. What happened to Tanker Bell? Why isn't he fighting the Champ? Know what I mean?"

"Don't you think they're askin' questions now?"

"Sure. But they ain't doin' it en masse. See?"

"Yeah," said Charlie Jingle softly. "Yeah. What I gotta do is hit Pugs, Inc. where they ain't got control of the situation. Where they don't have their stooges workin' to keep things quiet."

"Now you've got it," said the Commissioner, grinning.

"Okay. See you around," said Charlie, and started out.

"Take care," warned the Commissioner. But by that time Charlie Jingle was on his way.

* * * * *

At one o'clock of that afternoon, Charlie Jingle boarded a coast-to-coast rocket. Fifty-five minutes later, at ten fifty-five A.M. West Coast Time, Charlie Jingle set foot on the pavement of Los Angeles' Municipal Rocket-Port, hopped a cab, and got out on the lot of Galaxy Films. His business there took him two hours and twelve minutes, by which time he hopped another cab, was born back to the Rocket-Port, and bought a return ticket on the eastbound Rocket, scheduled for takeoff at five P.M.

Charlie found a few hours on his hands. He chose to divert himself at the Jet-Car Races in Culver City. He dropped forty dollars on the first two races, and had just bought another ticket when, as he walked away from the betting window, he saw a familiar profile marking possibilities on a racing sheet with a well-chewed pencil. He nudged up to Rabbit Markey, and in a half-whisper, asked:

"Got anything hot today, Jack?"

Rabbit Markey looked up with an annoyed frown, blinked, and when Charlie Jingle's face registered, laughed.

"'Lo, Charlie? How's things out on the Coast?"

"Things," said Charlie, shaking his hand, "are lousy. But they'll get better real fast. How about you, Rabbit? Out of the fights for good?"

Rabbit Markey sighed slow and long, nodding his head.

"I dumped my whole stable, Charlie, and when I come out here, I figured Jet-Car racing was a clean way to make a buck. So I bought me a Jet outfit. But it's the same tie-up as the fights was."

"I can imagine," said Charlie Jingle.

"No you can't, neither. For instance, you know who Jet-Cars Incorporated happens to be an affiliate of?"

"Wait! Don't tell me. Lemme guess." Charlie shut his eyes. "Pugs, Inc.?"

"Bingo," said Rabbit Markey dispiritedly. "You know who makes the drivers for the Jet-Cars?"

"Wait! Don't tell me!... Pugs, Inc.?"

"Bingo," said Rabbit Markey sadly, and Charlie laughed.

"That's the way the bugle blows, eh, Rabbit?"

"You know who's got the Commissioner of Jet-Car Races bought out?" went on Rabbit Markey.

"Wait! Don't tell--How do you know that, Rabbit?"

"Whatsa difference. I know. For sure! I happened to find out. Just like the old Fights Racket, eh, Charlie?"

"Yeah," said Charlie Jingle nervously. "Except that nobody's got Jergen bought out."

"Hunh?" exclaimed Rabbit Markey.

"What I said--nobody's got--"

"I heard ya, Charlie. I heard ya the first time. You mean you never heard about Jergen?"

"Heard? Heard what?"

"Boyo boyo boy! Buddy, you are in the middle of the neatest fix in history. You mean to say you don't know what's happening?"

"Fix? What kinda fix, Rabbit?... Are you kidding? I can't even get my boy a fight, and you're talking fix!"

"Aw Boyy! Awww Boyyyy are you a dummy! Lissen! Whatta you doin' out here onna Coast?"

"Doin'? I'm tryin' to set it up so I can get Tanker a fight, that's what I'm doin'!"

"You worked out a deal with some film company, huh?"

"That's right. Why?"

Rabbit Markey shot a glance to the right of him and one to the left, hunched his shoulders, pulled his trousers up, took Charlie by the lapel, and drew him close to a post. The buzzer sounded outside to announce that the race was within one minute of starting time.

"Charlie, you're about to be had. Now you're playin' it the way you was supposed to in the beginning. You was supposed to play ball with the Hollywood boys to begin with. Now you done it. Now the fix is in!"

"How the the hell can there be a goddam FIX?" screeched Charlie Jingle. "Tanker's level. Are you kiddin'?"

"Sure! Tanker's level! But how about the Contender? How about Hammerhead Johnny? How about Steamroller Jones?"

"You're crazy!" shouted Charlie Jingle. "It can't be! How the hell would _you_ know?"

"You wanna know how I know? My daughter Marie--you remember her, she was a kid when you seen her--she's a secretary to Mike Bretz, the East Coast Assistant Vice of Pugs, Inc.... She's got the whole map out, from the word go. Pugs, Inc. is puttin' things in your way so that everybody thinks you got a real thing in the Tank. They're helpin' you get a build-up, you see, as if they wanted to freeze you out. When you finally break through the freeze-out one way or the other, they're gonna have one hellofa drawing-card! Get it now, Charlie?"

Charlie Jingle walked away from Rabbit Markey, went some twenty paces, kicked a dent in a refuse-chute, and walked back.

"I don't believe it!" whispered Charlie Jingle hoarsely. "I don't believe it!"

The bugle blew outside. Rabbit Markey looked at Charlie, looked at his ticket, and started toward the race-track.

Charlie Jingle caught his arm.

"Wait a minute, Rabbit."

Rabbit Markey shook his head.

"I already said enough to float me in blood, Charlie. Now lemme go and watch the bloody no-good fixed races."

"No, Rabbit. Tell me more. Tell me who else is swingin' this deal?"

"Don't you know?"

"Harry Belok?"

Rabbit Markey nodded.

"Jergen?" asked Charlie Jingle with bated breath.

Rabbit Markey nodded his head.

"How they do it? Tinker with the Fighters?"

"You ever see Hammerhead get knocked off his feet?"

"I don't get it--they lemme buy my own way into the news, is that it? I think I'm perfectly legitimate. So does everybody else in the game. What then?"

"Then a story breaks someplace about the way Pugs, Inc. tried not to give you a fight. Everything looks like Pugs, Inc. is scared stiff of you because you can ruin them. Big build-up. Even Jergen goes to bat, confesses he tried to help you get the fight. Everybody's sore as hell at Pugs, Inc. They force a fight, Tanker goes in--and gets slaughtered. See?"

Charlie Jingle felt his guts deflate in a rush.

"Yeah," he said, dead-toned. "I see."

"What you gonna do?"

"I dunno. I got it set up with Galaxy Films to be waitin' in New York Rocket-Port with cameras. Couple of friends of mine are gonna fake a shootin' with me when I get there. Guess I've got no choice. I'll have to go through with it now."

"Okay now," said Rabbit Markey. "Now lemme go and get ulcers over the cars." He gave Charlie his hand and they shook slowly.

"Take care, kid--and thanks."

"Nahhh! Forget it! Forget you even saw me here! But don't forget what I told you. Harry Belok's got friends in LA, too. I got racing-ulcers, but I don't mind bein' alive with them. You get me?"

Charlie Jingle nodded again, and Rabbit Markey walked out into the roar of the Jet-Races. Charlie Jingle looked down at the ticket in his hand, ripped it in two, and let the pieces flutter to the floor.

Outside, he hailed a cab.

To board the Eastbound Rocket would have been to play into the very hands of his enemies. And he needed time to think--to figure his way out of the fix that had been planned for him. Perhaps by avoiding the Rocket trip, he would avoid the pre-planned shooting, the filming of which was also pre-set, and so avoid the press, and whatever consequent notoriety would follow the whole affair at the Rocket-Port.

So he hired a car and started to drive East.

* * * * *

There arose a great hue and cry at the disappearance of Charles Jingle, who had been a registered, scheduled passenger on the Eastbound Rocket. What had happened to him? What mystery cloaked his disappearance? Galaxy Films made it known that Charles Jingle suspected an attempt on his life. Why? asked a conscientious columnist. Who might have reason enough to threaten the life of a Robot-Trainer? Mischa Hannigan, innocently and in a moment of anger at what he thought must be vengeful murder, stated that attempts had been made to intimidate Charles Jingle into selling out Tanker Bell. Who had done so? Mischa Hannigan would not say, though hinting darkly that a "well-known fixer" was at the bottom of it.

The Press probed deeper into the mystery. What about Charles Jingle's property, Tanker Bell? Was it so valuable that the proprietor should be murdered for not parting with it? If it was, why had there been no offer of a match from the Champion?

It was then that some bright reporter conceived the idea of questioning the Fight Commission as to its views on the shamefully clandestine affair. What had it to say? Nothing, was the reply. The bright reporter launched an attack on the Commission. The fight public wanted to know what the Fight Commission thought its function was, if not to expose underground tactics in the game?

Commissioner Jergen addressed the citizenry via television. He admitted that Charles Jingle had been to see him. He admitted he was unable to move due to a lack of tangible evidence. He would not name the parties accused by Charles Jingle because there was no real evidence at this date. He would further investigate the situation, using every resource at his command.

When Charlie Jingle arrived in New York two days later the lid was off the town. Everyone was fuming at what had been perpetrated against him. Everyone understood why he had come into town unobtrusively.

What Charlie Jingle had sought to avoid had happened anyway. The play was in motion. There was no stopping it.

He watched the day-to-day developments in a state of paralyzed horror. It was a nightmare in which he was the principal, and yet, the bystander, the spectator. He had no choice but to follow. Rabbit Markey had shown him the truth, so that all things now had a double meaning, a reality and an unreality, another dimension, another depth.

When the press came to question him, Charlie fought the only way he knew. He denounced Pugs, Inc. as cheats, liars, and fixers. He denounced Commissioner Jergen, Harry Belok, the press, the Hollywood people, the prize-fight game, and the public in an attempt to break the whole business wide open.

But everyone understood.

"Mister Jingle is justified in his bitterness," said a reporter.

"Of course Charlie's sore. He's got a right to be sore!" said Commissioner Jergen.

"A horrible injustice. We were concerned over our reputation," said Kort Gassel of Pugs, Inc.

"The guy deserves a break!" said the fight public.

And Hollywood said, "We don't understand what prompted this unwarranted attack."

So there it was. Charlie Jingle spoke the truth, but nobody believed him. Tanker Bell was granted a match. The fix was in.

As a last resort, Charlie Jingle refused to let the Tanker fight. An uproar went up from the public. It was a matter of ethics. Tanker Bell was now their champion. He was the embodiment of everyman against the Organization, against injustice. Tanker Bell _must_ fight!

It was then that Charlie Jingle understood. This was not simply a fight. This was part of a long-range plan to bring the public man to heel. This was part of a scheme to break the mass-individual spirit, because if Everyman stood with Tanker Bell as the champion of independant justice, and Tanker Bell were beaten--so would the public-independent spirit be.

But Charlie Jingle had his hands tied.

* * * * *

On the day of the fight, Charlie Jingle corralled the Tanker in the workshop and ordered the amazed Tanker to lie down on the work-bench for a "tune up". The Tanker protested.

"You crazy, Charlie? Whuffor? I never felt so good in my life!"

"Don't gimme any arguments, Tank. Stretch out and shuddup."

"But Charlie...."

"Stretch out, for God's sake!"

"What you gonna do?"

"Re-vamp you. I'm gonna run the tapes on the bout with the Contender, and stuff your memory banks with tapes on every fight was ever had with a Pugs, Inc. product. Then I'm gonna run tapes on Hammerhead Johnny. I'm gonna key up your reflex-pattern to the point where you'll be operating so fast your joints are liable to break down in the ring."

Tanker stared at him, open-mouthed. "What for? Will you please tell me that? _What for?_"

"After I've fed you the tapes on the Contender and Hammerhead, you'll know, if those goddam memory-computers of yours ain't so rusty they can still work."

"You tryin' to teach me somethin' I don't know?"

"That's right."

"Why can't you just tell me?"

"If you figure it out yourself, you won't like it any more than if I told you; but you'll know it the hard way."

"What a hellofa way to teach me somethin'! Jazzin' me up! My co-ordination is perfect, analysis-system is workin' like a voodoo charm, and you wanna jazz me up! It's like committin' suicide!"

Something in the Tanker's face changed, quickly and suddenly, as if a diamond-bright idea exploded inside his steel-plated head.

"Charlie?"

Charlie Jingle looked up from his assortment of tools. "What?"

"Is this a fix?"

Charlie Jingle looked at him, the flush of anger brightening his eyes. "Is that a joke, Tanker?"

"No, Charlie. A question."

"Stretch out," said Charlie Jingle gruffly.

"Answer me first, Charlie. Is it?"

"Whatta you think?"

"I dunno," said the Tanker, stretching out slowly.

"You really wanna win that fight, kid?" asked Charlie Jingle, sad and tender.

"You know I do!"

"Trust me then, hah?"

The Tanker laughed, stretching out on the bench.

The light glittered cold on the smooth worn steel of the tools in Charlie Jingle's hands.

* * * * *